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So Yugioh (as it always manages to do) has become horribly stale with a solved meta and huge price of entry. Put in simpler terms: Spyral is too good and Ash Blossom and Joyous Spring is too expensive. I think I can quickly explain how Konami North America can fix the format and make the game more enjoyable and accessible.

Step 1: Give us a real Banlist that kills the established decks

The format is being run by the bogeymen of the past. I actually think that all of the Vrains era archetypes (even to an extent Trickstars) are fair, balanced and promote a somewhat back and forth gameplay…

Well maybe not World Chalice…

It’s only a handful of antiqued decks and problem cards in the current meta that are stifling newer play styles. It’s not that Magical Musketeers are bad, its’ that older decks like ABC are still too good. I think Konami is making a clear effort to make archetypes weaker and to make generic link monsters much better (I know that the Crystron Link will break the game in 2 eventually). Anyway, I might as well get to banlist part since that’s what 90% of ppl are here for.

Spyral

While Spyral only recently got its Link monster, its already proven too powerful to be allowed to live. The fact that every deck must run 5+ handtraps just to stymie the Spyral deck is absurd. Furthermore, Spyral exemplifies what I like to call the “10 minute turn”. This was started by Nekroz, made commonplace by Zoodiac and now has been perfected by Spyral. Basically the Spyral plays and combos take a large amount of time which causes their turns to be super long. This is the least fun aspect of the game because you know in your gut as you watch them play that unless you have a handtrap you likely won’t get much of a turn to play afterwards. Basically I think Spyral needs to be knocked down… hard. So much so that its best card should be banned…

I would like to see Spyral Resort banned as it provides the deck insane consistency. With Resort gone the deck would also lose access to Masterplan along with most of its basic combos. This will NOT kill the deck. Similar to Zoodiac players will innovate the deck to keep it meta relevant, which is fine. We need Spyral hit to give slower decks some breathing room. This in turn would lesson the need for handtraps. In my humble opinion the only reason handtraps are so good is because Spyral has gotten us in the mindset of “if I don’t stop them turn 1 I can’t play”. If the format slowed down, then handtraps would lose their relevance.

TLDR: Ban Spyral Resort

Invoked, ABC and Paleo

None of these decks are particularly oppressive, but all of them have overstayed their welcome as far as being meta relevant. I think Konami could seriously consider hitting all of these decks just to make people stop playing them. Also it should be pointed out THAT EVERY ONE OF THESE DECKS WAS ALREADY HIT IN THE OCG AGES AGO! I’m not going to say that Toad, Aleister and Dragon Buster all need to go to 1, but that I wouldn’t be surprised if they did, nor would I be upset.

Masterpeace was the problem, not Dinomight Knight. This deck like the former is just too good for the newer archetypes to handle because it inherently violates the basic rules of the game (multiple tribute summons per turn and tribute summoning without having to run bricky low level monsters) and is incredible in the grind game (True King’s Return smiles from the clouds). Yeah I think Masterpeace belongs at 1. The deck will still be playable, but not nearly as strong. Also I know that Masterpeace is searchable off Diagram and that some builds only play 1. However, I think Masterpeace to 1 would weaken the deck enough that ppl won’t play it that much.

TLDR: Limit Masterpeace the True Draco Slaying King to 1

Pendulum Magicians

Once Pendulums get Heavymetalfoes Electrumite in the new set it’s power and consistency will go through the roof. To prevent them from getting out of hand, I have a slightly unorthodox hit in mind.

Put Time Pendulumgraph to 1…

Now just wait a second and here me out…

I know that the threat of the deck lies in its ability to plus like crazy, but isn’t one of the biggest problems that it ends on the trap with Purple Poison Magician in scale? Scrap Dragon was a great Yugioh card. The Phantom Knights of Breaksword was an even greater Yugioh card. Well Time Pendulumgraph is like both of those cards on steroids. I’m not confident that limiting the trap to 1 will actually even hurt Pendulum Magicians. At the same time I’m not sure if a trap deserves to be banned in a format where we see very few trap cards see any play at all. I also don’t want to re-limit Skull Crobat Joker or Wisdom Eye since that would be akin to when Konami un-banned and then quickly re-banned Snatch Steal. It makes it seem too much like they made a clear mistake. For now I say hit the trap and see what happens. Also I know that the trap is searchable and that some builds only play 1. Despite this I think that if you can kill the trap once you should be safe.

TLDR: Limit Time Pendulumgraph to 1

Trickstar

I had to put this somewhere. Trickstar is totally fair (annoying, but fair) outside of the interaction between its themed trap Trickstar Reincarnation and the old handtrap Droll&Lock Bird. There is no reason why a combo that denies the opponent their whole hand should be allowed to exist in modern era Yugioh. I don’t care if its inconsistent. I don’t care if it only happens 2 games out of a 9 round tournament. This is literally the most unfair play of the format. If we put Reincarnation to 1, then the combo has to rely on the unsearchable card Disturbance Strategy and thus becomes nearly impossible to pull off. Does limiting Reincarnation kill Trickstar? It does hurt the deck insanely, but I think eradicating the salt from hand-looping players is well worth that risk.

TLDR: Limit Trickstar Reincarnation to 1

I’ll save Step 2 for another day. Just to be clear these aren’t necessarily the hits I want as much as hits I think could happen. Also I’m not an authority enough on Yugioh to say that any of these hits are truly correct. Feel free to tell me that I’m wrong and what other cards should be hit. I’ll gladly reply to civil comments. I will also just as easily delete troll comments.